An online winter event planned by Highland Pride has been cancelled.
The group had planned to run their popular winter event digitally this month due to the ongoing Covid pandemic.
However, due to them organising it at such short notice, organisers were unable to commit to the time it takes to run such a big event.
Highland Pride has run a number of very popular events in the region, including last year’s winter Highland Pride, and its annual Highland Pride parade.
They received a grant of £5000 from the Comic Relief LGBTQ+ Covid–19 Recovery Fund to run the online showcase.
In an online statement, chairwoman of Highland Pride Jessica Taylor said they had decided to postpone the event “with a heavy heart.”
She added: “Planning for Winter Pride started very late this year due to some personal circumstances within our team, and despite our intentions to try and catch-up and still deliver a programme that’s worthy of your time we’ve found that juggling working from home (for most of us), long online meetings, emails (they really never end), and a general feeling of burnout that we’re just not in a position to continue.
“Our team’s mental health and wellbeing will always be our top priority and we must look after each other in these strange and quite frankly (bad) times.
“We know as a supportive and caring community that you’ll understand this although we know it doesn’t stop it being a disappointment and we are truly gutted.
“We will still do our absolute best to highlight all the fantastic online events happening online for LGBT History Month, and if you have already planned something please do still let us know so we can help you promote it.
“We urge you all to attend these events if you can, not only connect with other LGBTQ+ people but to also show your support for the organisers at the other end…truly, online event planning is not as joyful as face-to-face events where organisers get to see your lovely faces.”
Highland Pride will be getting in touch with anyone who had events planned within the online showcase.